Egg yolk phospholipids: a functional food material to generate deep-fat frying odorants

BACKGROUND\ud Phospholipids are an important precursor for the generation of carbonyl compounds which play a significant role in the characteristic aroma of deep-fat fried foods. \ud RESULTS\ud Phospholipids extracted from hen egg yolks were added into sunflower oil (2.0 g/kg) and heated with or without chicken meat at 160 °C for 10 min, and then dynamic headspace extraction and GC-MS were used to extract and analyze the volatiles. The results showed that the characteristic deep-fat frying odorants, such as (E,E)-2,4-decadienal, (E,Z)-2,4-decadienal, as well as 1-octen-3-one, (E)-2-nonenal, octanal, methional, dimethyl disulfide and alkylpyrazines had increased by 3-65 times in the sunflower oil with added phospholipids, and increased up to 6 times in chicken meat which had been treated with phospholipids prior to heating. \ud CONCLUSION\ud There is potential for the food industry to use low levels of phospholipids, particularly egg yolk phospholipids, to increase deep-fat frying odorants in a wide range of deep fried products.